Salute

[James Deuce]

I stood up from my desk at 11:45am and announced to a room full of people with their bored heads in their boring work that I was heading out into the brilliant sunshine to wave goodbye to an old warrior and watch a Mk IX Spitfire fly over the city in tribute to both Sqn Ldr John Pattison, who died yesterday, and "our" Spitfire squadron of WWII, 485 Sqn.

A couple of heads went up at the mention of the word "Spitfire", however the pall of apathy and disbelief took me aback.

I remember when the WWI vets started hitting that decade in age between 80 and 90, where the misadventures of a life well lived tend to catch up with otherwise healthy men. Discussing war with men of this generation was strictly forbidden. Talking about first wives killed by an influenza epidemic that resonates so strongly through history that the world's medical professionals jump at any hint of an influenza mutation, prepared to treat 100s of millions and bury 10s of millions is also not just forbidden it was usually silenced with a good clip around the ear.

The WWII vets have hit the same wall, a wall that for all its wispy substance exists for everyone. We look back at them and wonder at the things these men were forced to do and some women chose to do and think of those people as somehow bigger than us, more special, their shadow diminishing all who stand in it, but I can tell you that not one of those men I have been privileged to speak with would go through that again, would chose to throw themselves into that particular crucible so willingly.

They were changed and few would say it was for the better. My Grandfather was a Commando, a little man, not 5'5" in height, but tough as old boots, and he was happiest in NZ, living in Tauranga, wrestling with the local council about the things that get OAPs excited, and trying to force an equitable arrangement from the NZ Government in regard to making them pay the UK 's Military pension directly to those who were due it rather than simply keeping it to offset the cost of relocating so many of the UK's servicemen to NZ nearly 50 years ago. They paid tax in NZ until they retired, and the service pensions were earned putting their lives on the line, not working for the Gas company in NZ.

My wife's favourite Great Uncle died recently. He was someone I could call a mate. He was a laugh, and he was what we called a "Conchy" in WWII, a conscientious objector who worked as a Medic at a prison camp for Japanese PoWs at a place called Featherston, not far from Wellington where I live now. He was there when the Japanese prisoners rioted after a guard panicked and shot and killed a PoW. He ran into the ensuing gunfire and pulled Japanese PoWs out of the line of fire and treated them while under fire from his own colleagues. It took me 12 years to get that paragraph out of him.

So I watched this Spitfire Mk IX, this indescribably beautiful war machine inscribe its graceful imprint on my skies, more than 60 years after it ceased to operate in its prime role. I thought about 485 Sqn trying to deliver ordinance on V-Weapon sites prior to D-Day and how horribly inappropriate it is think so one dimensionally about these people who were doing what they were taught was right, without question, principle before personal safety. 485 Sqn participated in operations in Northern Europe like D-Day, Operation Market Garden, and lost 11 Spitfires on the ground during Bodenplatte whilst stationed in Belgium.

John Pattison took a 20mm cannon shell in the thigh from a 109 after three weeks of operating out of Biggin Hill during the Battle of Britain. By war's end he was back in the thick of the action after a period as an instructor. It's easy for us to look at his air to air tally of 2 and think, "He wasn't even an ace".

I like to imagine that like my Grandfather and my Wife's Great Uncle he was probably more comfortable being regarded as a human being, or perhaps a farmer, than a warrior.

Gen Y may not care, and the children of those volunteers and conscripts, who had to deal with these damaged citizen warriors as they healed their mental wounds, sometimes over decades, may have tired of them, but I forgive them their strangeness, I'm privileged that some of them felt comfortable telling me about losing their hair overnight, or soiling themselves while someone tried to shoot their aircraft down, or having to take being spat at by "friends" for defending unarmed prisoners. But they taught me that I don't have to stand in their shadow because they fought for me to have an ordinary life, with plenty of food, a long life filled with love and happiness, and the chance to enjoy the small things without sometimes having to deal with the uninvited guest of imminent death at the hand of your fellow man.

Most of all, I miss them.

[Ocean1]

Nice.

And bugger, I missed the old girl.

I also miss my uncle,who was a tail end gunner in a Lancaster. Eight times. I believe the life expectancy was about two missions.

[Pussy]

Well said, Jim.
Pussy snr was too young for service in WWII, but had NO hesitation volunteering and spending 20 months of his young life in Korea.
Up until recently, he told me almost nothing about it. He was "just a retired farmer". It was with great pride for me to see the NZ flag on his coffin, and the RSA pay tribute to him at his funeral.
We all owe that generation of fine young men more than we'll ever know.

BTW... if the Spitfire was the Ohakea based one, it is a Mk IX

[James Deuce]

BTW... if the Spitfire was the Ohakea based one, it is a Mk IX

Not sure. Got no details whatsoever anywhere. It did have the "pointy" empennage characteristic of XVIs, but some of the c wing IXs had it too.

It flew off to the West and then banked South, not to be seen again.

[Katman]

Most of all, I miss them.

Lest we forget.

[Fatt Max]

It is an awesome sight and no mistake. We are so lucky to be living in a time when we do not have to rely on these steel tankers to defend us from impending invasion etc etc.

I'm not banging on about the 'good old days' or anything, just saying that I am grateful for their sacrifice. The aircrews were wedged into these things, no possible escape route within easy reach and dodging the ever present threat of someone in the same situation trying to blow the shit out of you.

This is not to take anything away from modern day warfare and the brave souls who are engaged in it, but the difference is like carrying out surgery with a blunt table knife or a modern day lazer scapel.

More importantly, good on you JD for having the decency within you to respect and honour Sqdn Ldr Pattison. I fear that this is a dying attutude among modern day people who would prefer to give 'big ups' to anyone who got past a decent level in a PC game.

It is stuff like this that gives me a lump in the throat, just like the dawn parade or even having a chin wag with some of the older guys in our local RSA. I spent my teens and twenties playing in bands, getting pissed and doing the 'rock n roll' thing. They had far less pleasurable experiences yet they never resent me for it, just shows you really how these guys are.

Thanks JD for a great post

[AllanB]

Next time stand up and announce that your are off to a strip bar for a beer, does anyone what to come along. Probably get more interest. :beer:

I'm pretty sure the average Joe does not give a hoot about the sound of an engine roaring. :oi-grr:

[MisterD]

If the sound of a Merlin doesn't make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck...well you're clinically dead for my money.

[Mom]

Wish you worked in my office J2.

How fantastic!

[AllanB]

Head down to Wanaka next Easter - it's ear drum splitting delightful :banana:

[Pedrostt500]

Well said JD, a mate of mine worked for an ex battle of britten fighter piolet, a number of yrs ago, the old bugger showed me where he had a hill side slide out from under his bulldozer, he rode the dozer down the slide for about 40mtrs till it stopped, then tried to work his way out, then slid to the bottom of the gully, when the hill slipped again, he thought nothing of it, he was well into his late 70s then. It took my mate over a week to dig a track in with a digger to get the dozer out.

[trumpy]

Good post James.
At 56 I consider it a great privilege to have reached this age and not have to be called upon to go to war and I credit that privilege to my father's generation.
I don't know about you, but at 18 I had a head full of hormones and was having a great time "preparing" myself for my future as I perceived it at the time ( and doing my best to confuse my brain with alien substances, liquid and otherwise).
My father however, at 18, was getting the arse shot out from under him at the battle of the River Plate. To put that into perspective try to imagine losing 60 (yes 60) of your friends in one direct hit, coping with that and then having to put it aside to attend to your own, and your remaining friends, survival. Big ask for someone just out of school. And for that privilege he received a month's R and R and then spent the rest of the war (until being demobbed in '45) on the HMS Belfast (now a permanent memorial on the Thames River, London) dodging U-boats in the North Atlantic on the Russian convoys.
I now know something of his experiences of WW2 and the humbling part of this has been that I had to glean most of this information from books, official sources and his friends and family as he would only refer to this time as "simply doing his duty". In effect he gave up his youth so that I could have mine (yes, I know I wasn't born at the time, but my Father had a strong sense of the future and what was needed to protect it).
Agreed, much of his humility has to do with painful memories, but humility it still is.
The only times I have been able to get him to open up is through two quite extraordinary experiences; firstly, because he hadn't for some reason received his Russian convoy medals he was tracked down here in Taupo by the Russian Embassy about ten years ago and formally presented with his medals and secondly, through a twist of fate through a book my Mother had taken out of the library for him and he was reluctantly reading (just to keep her happy...), he discovered in detail what had happened to his brother, who had been a bomber pilot and has only ever been listed as "missing", and even where in France he was buried. Thanks to Mr Google and the wonders of the internet were able to sit him down in front of the computer and not only get more details on the incident but also a picture of his brother's grave. Quite an event for him after 50 years.
We have much to be grateful for.

[nighthawk]

If the sound of a Merlin doesn't make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck...well you're clinically dead for my money.

Does it for me....Well said JD2, I had the pleasure to know and respect my grandfather a WW1 veterain who was one of six survivors of his company after 4 years of sheer hell. He never once complained or spoke of his experiences until we grandsons were old enough to REALLY understand.

This world is a better place for the sacrafices made by those many brave souls...

[Pedrostt500]

Maurice Shadbolt, compiled a book called Voices of Gallipoli, first published in 1988, he interviewed WW1 vetrans, most Gallipoli survivours, worth reading as their story varies quiet a bit form the official Gallipoli story. the book is well worth reading.

[Manxman]

I stood up from my desk at 11:45am and announced to a room full of people with their bored heads in their boring work that I was heading out into the brilliant sunshine to wave goodbye to an old warrior and watch a Mk XVI Spitfire fly over the city in tribute to both Sqn Ldr John Pattison, who died yesterday, and "our" Spitfire squadron of WWII, 485 Sqn.

Here, here.

[pete376403]

Thanks Jim for that post. My dad was Army (Engineers) in North Africa and Italy. My uncle was a navigator in a Wellington bomber. I appreciate what they did, glad others do too.

[riffer]

Thanks for the reminder Jim.

It's been three years and a month since my uncle Gerry Gotlieb (936-38) passed. He flew Spitfires in the European theatre of World War II.

I miss him still. :(

[rainman]

Most of all, I miss them.

Well said, James. My old man was in WWII, radio op on planes all over the southern end of Europe. Lied about his age to get in. Our lives have been so different in many ways. I'd love to talk to him about that time (not sure he would) but he's been dead for years.

[ManDownUnder]

J2... good sir... fucking awesome thread.

I enjoyed the perspective on those that IMHO do deserve recognition and the gratitude of their country. Lots to say - but I don't have the words. It'd only be a re-write of what you said already I expect.

Yet another reminder of those we do actually owe something to. Something real, tangible. I'm bloody glad I'm not/I wasn't the one that's up there risking it all.

[gijoe1313]

I was down at Waioru Army Museum this weekend past, always visit it when I can and reading the histories, looking at the displays always has me ruminating on those times ... lest we forget.

The new display of WWI items to commemorate those times are quite amazing, even had the poem by Wilfred Own "In Flander's Fields" prominent. I love reading about the history of times gone by, but forever shudder at the implications and colossal waste of life from them.

[oldrider]

Nice thread James, I have just been talking (by phone) to my last (maternal) living uncle and he was a pilot in England during WW2.

He is 87 now and at the time was considered too young for operations flying and was used to ferry all manner of aircraft back and forth to the front lines for replacement etc. (spitfires among them)

My Aunt, (his wife) was in the control centre, where all those little model aeroplanes got shunted around the table during operations etc.

They met because he recognised her voice somewhere as the voice who had talked him back to safety after his plane (unarmed) was damaged by the enemy on a return flight from Germany or some place in Europe and they got chatting!

I was borne at the start of WW2 and have clear memories of the latter stages of those times.

My uncle became a school teacher on his return and while a highly respected and successful as a teacher, he was asked to leave, when the PC anti discipline brigade began to aspire to the principal roles in our schools.

Well, we all now know how successful that program has been!

The odd thing about that was that the only kid he ever disciplined with a strap was me and the reason for that was I had made it and presented it to him when he became a teacher!

Little did I know that he would be returning to teach at our school!

I should have gone into the strap building business because it worked perfectly! :lol:

The men and women of WW2 vintage are passing away very quickly now, soon it will be almost a forgotten era!

How fortunate I have been to have lived the life that they all fought and dreamed of preserving. :yes:

[yungatart]

Nice post JD!
If I'd been in your office, I would have joined you.

One of hXc's most memorable moments in Belgium was laying the NZ wreath at Ypres on Anzac day and then wandering around the war cemeteries....looking at the grave markers of kids his own age who had gone off to war and never made it home again.
How different his trip to Europe was! (For which I am truly grateful)

[vifferman]

Yeah, it's easy to forget the war - it was so long ago, and so many people who lived through it are either gone, or in their twilight years.
There's no-one in my family who served in WWI, and not many in WWII, but listening to (or reading of) the experiences of those who did is rather sobering. My mother's cousin was at the Somme, saw a man and a horse blown up next to him, and suffered mental illness throughout the rest of his life, before committing suicide during his retirement years, when he had too much time to just sit and remember.

My parents befriended a couple on a ship in the early '50s, who were emigrating to NZ. Alec served in the Cameron Highlanders, and was at Dunkerque. Their children (all four of them) were killed when a bomb destroyed the upstairs of their house, where the kids were sleeping. They never really recovered from this, but thought moving to another country would help. Alec was a sweet and gentle man (apart from shooting hundreds of mynahs and the odd cat, to protect the starling chicks in the boxes on his shed and garage). He ended up drinking himself to death, when his wife unexpectedly died before him, and he couldn't handle being left alone with his memories.

My mother lived in Oxford and was only a child during the war. While her father (a department store window dresser) was away basically playing at being a soldier, her mother got involved with a Canadian soldier, got pregnant, and my grandfather (who'd had several mistresses) kicked her out, had her army stipend cut off (which was illegal) so she was penniless, and split up the family. My mother and one sister were sent to live with some distant relative, my aunt and uncle (who were preschoolers) were sent to an orphanage, and another aunt was adopted out. My mother ended up in Bognor Regis, and saw first-hand a very brave girl, only 19, who set off to France in her little boat to help with the evacuation of soldiers. The beach, so beautiful and tempting during summer, was inaccessible due to barbed wire and tank traps above the high tide mark.

Both my in-laws are Dutch. I didn't realise until fairly recently that my father-in-law was involved in the Dutch underground/resistance during Nazi occupation. As a boy, he was sometimes involved in smuggling food and armaments, usually in a wheelbarrow covered with more innocuous items. He and a cousin were also involved in hiding and smuggling Allied airmen out of the country. His memories of the war were seldom talked about, but he saw his brother get run over by a German tank. They were walking down a narrow street, when the tank came down it. They pressed up against the wall, but the tank driver deliberately edged the tank over and crushed Willy.
When the Allied forces moved into the Netherlands, the first troops into my in-law's town were a Scottish regiment, much to my father-in-law's amusement: "Mum! Soldiers wearing skirts!" Fortuitously, his mother had lived in Scotland for years, and spoke good English, so their lounge became a command centre for the troops, who gave the family food in exchange for translation and information.

My mother-in-law's family emigrated to NZ not long after the war, coming here solely because it was a Dutch-sounding country, and as far away from Europe and the horrors of the war as they could get. My mother-in-law's brother was killed by a hand grenade, and her sister blinded in one eye.

I had the honour and pleasure of staying with my father-in-law's cousin in Nevato at Christmas time. He is a very gentle man, who gained passage to California and was granted citizenship, due to his services to the US armed services. As a teenager during the war, he was involved with arms smuggling, and hiding and smuggling Allied troops (mostly airmen). They would transport them by bicycle at night, and hide them in haystacks and barns. Because he spoke good English (he trained at the seminary), he acted as a translator when the US troops moved into Holland, and was recruited into the 7th Amoured Division, which lead to him being wounded twice (once when the tank he was riding on was blown up by a Panzer, and everyone apart from him was killed - including the dog he was holding). This caused problems, as he didn't have dogtags, and was shipped from field hospital to field hospital, being refused treatment because he was thought to be a German, or because he was Dutch not French. Another time, he was almost shot by a camp guard who was told to shoot anyone who didn't know the password du jour. Jan forgot part of it, and as his accent was suspicious, the guard went to shoot him. Luckily the guard was too hasty, the clip fell out of the "grease gun", and someone who knew Jan came along before he could reload it.

Despite the privations and horrors of war, people still got on with living and having fun. Jan was called "The Chow Hound" by his new comrades. When they were liberating towns occupied by the Nazis, houses that the officers had commandeered were often full of strange German food and beverages, which Jan was called on to test to make sure it was edible. After years of not enough to eat, this was not a role he found at all hard.

Soon the "war generation" will be gone, and so will their memories and stories. Unfortunately, because humans seem to be expert at finding reasons for conflict, there will always be those among us who have first hand experience of how cruel people can be to one another, and how very fragile our peace can be. Even events at home, like the Springbok tour of 1981, can illustrate how quickly violence can erupt in a peaceful country.

[ynot slow]

Well said, Jim.
Pussy snr was too young for service in WWII, but had NO hesitation volunteering and spending 20 months of his young life in Korea.
Up until recently, he told me almost nothing about it. He was "just a retired farmer". It was with great pride for me to see the NZ flag on his coffin, and the RSA pay tribute to him at his funeral.
We all owe that generation of fine young men more than we'll ever know.

BTW... if the Spitfire was the Ohakea based one, it is a Mk IX

Well said re our older ww2 vets,when ww2 was in swing mum had 5 uncles go off and all came back uninjured(physically anyway),not bad for small town Manaia,amazing to read the monuments in small towns,heaps of guys with same surnames who never returned,that is when you realise the cost of war.

Think I heard it referred as Mk 9(for those unsure of roman numerals)as well on the news.Sadly the impression a lot of us have of the power and grace of the spitfire is from movies,Battle of Britain being one of the best.

[Fatjim]

Good on you mate.

[vifferman]

amazing to read the monuments in small towns,heaps of guys with same surnames who never returned,that is when you realise the cost of war.
I know what you mean - when in Adelaide recentlyish, we went for an early morning stroll, and ended up at the war memorial. It was very moving to see the monuments, the roll of honour, and to think of what the list represented.
I just couldn't imagine my sons going off to war - it'd be absolutely devastating.

[MSTRS]

What a wonderful post, young man. That deserves to be published, perhaps as the Editorial in the DomPost.

[Grubber]

Cheers for that! My Dad did the trench work in Guadacanal fighting the japanese.
He passed on at the ripe old age of 76???? Still fit as when he passed. The heart just gave out. Too much crap in his early life i suggest.
Miss him dearly.

Lest we forget

[James Deuce]

It was the Ohakea IX. The Empennage was the rounded one. Found a picture on page 349, Section C, sub section 42 of the DomPost. Mine eyes are old.

[SPman]

PV270 - Brendan Deeres one, in the wartime markings of his uncle, Alan Deere. Some good pics here http://rnzaf.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=Airshows&action=display&thread=9495

Good on you young James!


What a wonderful post, young man. That deserves to be published, perhaps as the Editorial in the DomPost. - quite so!


One thing I was going to mention to you was the answer as to why the Uncle did not have “kill” markings on his aircraft – the simple answer was he didn’t think much of the practice.
He saw it as making too much “glory” of what was essentially an unpleasant but necessary task – that is successfully destroying another aircraft/pilot. He had little time for those that followed that practice.


I remember my grandparents generation - those from the first world war, and the effect it had on that generation - in the hallway of my great aunts house, was a photo board, of all the friends, fiances, and relations who went overseas - 37, and only 17 came back! A photo of my grandfather, a Lewis gunner, with 2 of his mates, taken in mid 1917 after a particular battle - they were the only survivors from his company - blown up by a shell in early 1918, he was on an 80% war disability pension until he died at 99 and 9 months old! I still have a lump of shell casing they took out of his leg, with a shred of woollen trouser thread attached! My great uncle, winning the MM at Paschendaele and, as a Lance Corporal, being the highest ranking person to survive in his company!
My parents generation - the WW2 survivors - nearly all gone now. Dad suffering a broken neck after being blown over a cliff, whilst winkling Japanese out of a cave in the islands - he's still around at 92. His brother - a driver for a chaplain in the LRDG in the desert and Italy - who came back totally changed by his experiences. His cousins - one a coastwatcher who worked behind Japanese lines for most of the war and his brother - who refused to fight and spent most of the war hiding from the authorities. Who was his biggest supporter - his brother, the one risking his life every day! Cousin Ed Hillary, serving in the Airforce, whilst his brother Rex spent the war in a camp for conchies because of his beliefs - no one thought any the worse of them for that. Because, that was what is was about - the right to freedom of thoughts and beliefs..
A Polish mate of dads - escaped from Poland to France, then stole a French airforce plane to get to England. Served with the RAF, flying Hurricanes post BOB, then in the Middle East. Told me once of being shot down on a raid on a harbour in Italy. He ended up under a rock wall on the foreshore with an enemy machine gun post on top - he thought he was done for! He managed to wriggle out of that one and ended up with Italian partisans for some months.
Would any of those people talk about their experiences? Not generally - you had to be lucky (and in my case, have a handy recording walkman at the time) and just occasionally they would open up, just a little, but only about the good times, rarely about the bad.
That generation is going now - in another few years they will be all gone, as well - like the WW1 generation. Few of them wanted to go, most of them wanted to forget and none of them wanted the experience repeated on future generations. As I got older, I understood the drinking RSA mentality that, as a rebellious youth, I disdained mightily. It helped perhaps, blot out the memories, amongst those who understood.

Soon, they will all be gone - but - from my perspective, not forgotten!

[Clivoris]

You're a bastard Jim. Another wonderful post that brought a tear to my eye. I'm fairly optimistic about the current crop of young ones maintaining respect for those who gave so much in the two World Wars. The increased interest in ANZAC day and other events is a good sign.
Great thread people.

[peasea]

Thanks Jim for that post. My dad was Army (Engineers) in North Africa and Italy. My uncle was a navigator in a Wellington bomber. I appreciate what they did, glad others do too.

Was going through some shite, trying to find unrelated family snaps and came across a picture of my olds on their first date, a bicycle ride in 1934. They married in 39, the day war broke out. Off goes the old man into the Royal Navy. Ended up doing minesweeping for the Russian convoys (Mermansk way), saw action in the Pacific Fleet (hence the move to NZ after being stuck in Wgtn for repairs, he fell in love with the country, clever boy) then rounded it out with the Normandy invasion on D-Day.

He was one of the lucky buggers.

The Spifire was an awesome machine alright, flown by equally (or more) awesome men. (They sound fuckin' cool too.) As Winnie said; "Never before in the history of human conflict have so many owed so much to so few."

I never forget what those buggers did, nor what their wives (like my mum) endured at home. V1 bombs still ring in my eldest sisters' ears, she's 70 next year and was a toddler in the blitz. What a way to remember your childhood.

Yes, I remember those people... and not just on ANZAC Day.

On ya J2, good one.

See the attached; my mum and dad on their first date, 1934. Think what they were about to experience.

[Pussy]

Yes, I remember those people... and not just on ANZAC Day.



Great sentiment, peasea! :niceone:

[James Deuce]

I'd like to rehabilitate a post of mine, something I hope conveys the depth of humanity that most old warriors exude.

None of them want to be worshipped. Most of them initially thought they were doing the right thing. Not a one of them would mistake the smell of arterial blood and ruptured bowels for glory.

http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/showthread.php/107788-Salute?p=1129407301#post1129407301

[Macontour]

Nice to read the original thread. I too would have gone outside for the Spitfire. I was at the Auckland ANZAC service today.Ive been in the Green Machine(Reserves) for 26 years and it is pretty much a pleasure to attend. Not many of the oldies left but they always get a round of applause from the young ones.I was there when they wound upthe 28th Maori Battalion Association because there are so few left, only 23 or 24 left now.

Very hard to imagine 18 year olds today going off to fight for 4 or 5 years and endure what our older veterans went through.And yet we have lost 10 in Afghanistan who were remembered today. Gladthey are allhome now. And there was an item on Campbell live tonight about an old guy who has waited 70years for his Atlantic Star medal for all the convoy trips he did on ships. Most of the ships that he served on got sunk and he somehow survived the war. He mentioned the Tanker ships that got hit and basically just disappeared with all crew....no survivors.

We will remember them

[cheshirecat]

re 18 year olds going off to fight. I was born post war, remembering well when sweet rationing stopped and played in bomb craters. I've lived through the Korean war, Vietnam, Cold war where several friends just dissapeared, IRA bombing my best pub and leaving bits of horses and men in trees and more recently Falklands, Iraq and Afganistan. Thanks to those who fought and sacrificed so much, mine however, is the first generation where going to war wasn't compulsory so my son and his mates don't need to kill foreigners on a governments wims. 18 years old though is the best age for going to war, they have the energy, naive moralities and such a deep sense of immortality. The generals in the WW1 knew this well.